That sounds fun, I'll definitely give it a try. Speaking of goblin transmuters, they are another bunch who can go silly with increased mana.Once I played a sorta 'pacifist' run with them - tried to reach level 10 and win without killing any monsters besides the bosses.http://s27.postimg.org/v5y9sp66b/xp_muter_2.png

I thought this idea was brilliant; ended up doing a "pacifist" run on Venture Cave. I'm assuming turning the enemies to stone doesn't count as a kill, since you don't get the kill XP (definitely abused the +1xp for slowed though! ^^;)

Also let's not forget that the KB damage nicely softened my 2nd boss as well. I'm not sure if the Goo's 75% resist seriously decreased it or not, so maybe it can be even greater in other scenarios too.http://s13.postimg.org/n1kieaz3b/new_build4.png

For reference I checked a monster's corrosion, looks like I only took 10 doses of greenblood.http://s29.postimg.org/doumgvelj/new_build7.pngSo EM was unneeded, the mana I spent under her could have been used under a prepped Mystera for greater effect and earlier boons too.My race wasn't even ideal for this boss and god combo, imagine the destruction a gnome could cause, especially with matching items.

Sidenote: if platinum challenges existed, this could be a possible candidate. Your starting item is MW, and you're allowed to take alchemist,blacksmith and mage guild preps. EM and MA are guaranteed to spawn, monsters have the no XP trait (but give 10 piety for petrification). Apart from Bearmace, no preps are necessary, the rest is there to make it look less scary.

I love how our player tech has improved over time. A level one bosskill has gone from a theoretical challenge to "eh, here's a first level bosskill, it's okay I guess. Needs improvement."

I'm a little unclear on how you cast all those CYDSTEPS. Obviously you had Refreshment and Clearance, but you're talking like Earthmother isn't even needed, and I don't see how what you did could be possible using Refreshment alone.

Also, does corrosion trigger on knockback? Wht about on creatures hit by a knocked-back monster?

And to be honest, I didn't even use a single dose of clearence. On my 1st pic the bosses are at full health, and EM is already desecreated

Why isn't EM needed? Her only important boon is greenblood, but it's mana cost is keep rising with each cast. It would be much more mana efficient to just keep casting Cydstepp and hitting the boss with Martyr Wraps. Especially, if you worship MA and it costs a flat 8 mp.If you didn't worship EM, you also would not need to waste mana for being able to convert out. No plant would steal your boosters, gold or shops. For an efficient player EM is actually a disadvantage

You seem to underestimate the power of MA: boosting max mana and taking mystic balance work fantastically together. This time I didn't even restrict myself on potion usage, so mana potions and a single schadenfraude helped me greatly.And my early manapots knocked off some resists too, while as being an orc each glyph converted boosted my damage.Plus MW makes all my hits grow stronger.

Yes, corrosion triggers on KB. That's the sole reason I brought the bearmace. It was meant to be a testing run, since I wasn't sure if the Goo's 75% resist will disable that. I mean with 25% KB, reduced to it's 1/4, you'd need 16 basedamage to deal 1 damage and the 2nd portion of corrosion damage, but luckily it doesn't work like that. Even with 5 basedamage it works.

I have no idea what the answer is for your last question, forgot to test that

Edit: forgot to mention my goal with this strat, I want to achieve that it works on all maps with 100% reliability even with the VT token added.

Ha! For some reason, I didn't think about potions. At all. I was thinking "Refreshment gives 8x5=40 mana, which is not enough." But then there are also 4 mana potions and a pair of Schadenfreude potions, which easily tip the balance.

Mana burning bosses are going to be painful. You'll probably have to prep quest items and scum for the soul orb.

Sidestepper wrote:I love how our player tech has improved over time. A level one bosskill has gone from a theoretical challenge to "eh, here's a first level bosskill, it's okay I guess. Needs improvement."

Depends on your perspective XD

As for them specifically, whether you thought about it as a theoretical challenge or in terms of optimization mostly boiled down to which classes/gods/dungeons you were playing around with and have you stumbled onto elements which lend themselves to it naturally. Whole load of elements in the game for a whole load of different shennanigans ^^

For example, if you were in a habit of supplementing/performing a boss kill per run with "free" (health independent) hits, not attempting it at lvl 1 was probably due to an extra assumption rather than lack of one. In other words, back in the day, people have probably been going through the necessary motions for the most basic ones, they just never thought it's possible to muster up the damage while ignoring so many elements in a dungeon. Then one day we didn't XD And then the devs made it an achievement and broke that "this can't be right" barrier and now a lvl1 bosskill is a legit thing to consider.

Plus, we've been in a beta for long, and when you do a lvl1 boss kill during playtesting it's always a bit sketchy. Is this legit, or am I abusing something? Being able to kill a boss at lvl1 with something was usually a strong indicator that whatever you were using might warrant a nerf. This is why when I went on a spree of them back in the day I wasn't happy if it involved the old tri-sword, it felt like cheating.

EDIT: Come to think of it, the original "let's blow this lvl1 boss kill thing wide open" rampage was actually triggered by a balancing/bug report. I'd have to dig up who figured out that the Transmuter could do it too easily and reported it as a bit of an exploit, which got addressed, but sparked a landslide of experimentation with more appropriately skill/knowledge intensive researchi into it ^^ I think it might've been Dreamdancer, it certainly warrants a proper name drop, as at least I'm greatful for it

Still if it takes a bit of effort, more than a couple of elements and a bit of ingenuitiy, it's a very fun and relaxing puzzly thingy to do